Netherlands in the Eurovision Song Contest 2003

Eurovision Song Contest 2003
Country	Netherlands
National selection
Selection process	Nationaal Songfestival 2003
Selection date(s)	1, 8, 15 & 22 February 2003 1 March 2003
Selected entrant	Esther Hart
Selected song	"One More Night"
Finals performance
Final result	13th, 45 points

The Netherlands was represented by Esther Hart, with the song '"One More Night", at the 2003 Eurovision Song Contest, which took place in Riga, Latvia on 24 May. 32 songs took part in the Dutch preselection, which consisted of four semi-finals in February, followed by the final on 1 March.

Semi-finals

Four semi-finals were held in February 2003 to select the eight songs to progress to the Dutch final. The semi-finals were held at the Hart van Holland venue in Nijkerk and were hosted by Harm Edens. Eight songs competed in each semi-final and were voted on by a combination of an expert jury and telephone/SMS. The song placed first by the jury and that placed first by televoting qualified for the final. In the event that both the jury and the televoters placed the same song first (as happened in all but the third semi-final), the song placed second in the televote also qualified.

Semi-final 1 Semi-final 1 - 1 February 2003 Draw Artist Song Jury Televotes 1 Sunny's Inc. "Mamboleo" 10 7% 2 Aletia Bourne "Wanna Be the One" 49 4% 3 Martin Frankena "Zoeken in de lucht" 45 8% 4 Astrit "Together Forever" 38 9% 5 Jerique Allan "All About Love" 35 8% 6 Mary Amora "Somewhere by the River" 61 41% 7 Blauwdruk "Hotel t'hart" 5 6% 8 Zooom "Boogie" 37 17%

Semi-final 2 Semi-final 2 - 8 February 2003 Draw Artist Song Jury Televotes 1 The Beanuts "Give It Up!" 50 7% 2 Barbara Lok "Als twee vrienden" 18 10% 3 Esther Hart "One More Night" 73 30% 4 Sofuja & Glen Corneille "She Would" 63 15% 5 Steffen de Wolff "Jij laat me nooit meer los" 9 3% 6 Mango Nuts "Time to Party" 53 18% 7 Suzanne "Over the Moon" 21 11% 8 Georges Lotze "Footprints in the Sand" 17 6%

Semi-final 3 Semi-final 3 - 15 February 2003 Draw Artist Song Jury Televotes 1 The Soullistics "We Can't Stop the Music" 21 9% 2 Julia West "Talking Angels" 49 6% 3 Mazzel "Nananana" 12 19% 4 Brothers "Stand as One" 10 3% 5 Sandra Abbink "Beautiful Life" 61 18% 6 Jeffrey "Waar en wanneer" 5 4% 7 Arwin Kluft "Turiddu" 47 24% 8 Ebonique "Heatwave" 75 17%

Semi-final 4 Semi-final 4 - 22 February 2003 Draw Artist Song Jury Televotes 1 Kathy Bloom "I'm On Fire" 46 4% 2 Boulevard "Souvenirs" 20 6% 3 Lewis & Simon "Let's Give It a Try" 58 5% 4 Sasja Brouwers "Rauw" 4 6% 5 Gordon "I'll Be Your Voice" 82 36% 6 Bert Heerink & Manou "Blue Skies Are For Free" 11 23% 7 De Helden "Omdat jij jij bent" 23 4% 8 A-Teaze "Don't Cry" 36 16%

Final

The national final was held on 1 March at the Ahoy Arena in Rotterdam, hosted by Loes Luca. Voting was a 50/50 spilt between televoting/SMS and an expert jury. Hart emerged the comfortable victor with Gordon in second place.^[1] On the day after the contest a technical problem came to light, whereby a significant number of SMS votes had been either not counted at all or attributed to the wrong song. A revised scoring table was issued to correct the mistakes. The only change in placement was that Bert Heerink & Manou, who had originally placed seventh, were moved up to fifth, with Mango Nuts and Mary Amora correspondingly dropping a place.

Final - 1 March 2003

Draw	Artist	Song	Points (amended)	Place (amended)
1	Mango Nuts	"Time to Party"	31	6
2	Mary Amora	"Somewhere by the River"	28	7
3	Bert Heerink & Manou	"Blue Skies Are For Free"	50	5
4	Gordon	"I'll Be Your Voice"	123	2
5	Esther Hart	"One More Night"	165	1
6	Ebonique	"Heatwave"	63	4
7	Arwin Kluft	"Turiddu"	87	3
8	Zooom	"Boogie"	13	8

At Eurovision

On the night of the final Hart performed 14th in the running order, following Israel and preceding the United Kingdom. At the close of the voting "One More Night" had received 45 points from nine countries (the highest being 10 from Russia), placing the Netherlands 13th of the 26 entries. The 12 points from the Dutch televote were awarded to contest winners Turkey.^[2]

See also

• Netherlands in the Eurovision Song Contest
• Eurovision Song Contest 2003

References

1. ^ ESC National Finals database 2003
2. ^ ESC History - Netherlands 2003